For those who are unfamiliar, The Hague is the political capital of Holland. While Amsterdam is its capital, The Hague is home to the Netherlands' parliament house and is where most of the politicians reside. Why this is the case, I really do not know. I can only think that the only feasible reason is because Amsterdam has too many immigrants, rendering it unsafe for important political figures to stay here. Oh well. Den Haag is the Dutch name for The Hague by the way, in case you haven't figured it out. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) is also located there. If the name sounds familiar, it's because you probably heard it on Channel News Asia before; that's where Singapore's dispute with Malaysia regarding Pedra Branca is being settled!
Why I went there is this; Fadhil received an invitation from the Malaysian Embassy, located there also, for the celebration of Maulidur Rasul s.a.w , so he asked me along. Now, i know some of you are going, "Ape ni sambut Maulud semue?"! I'm not gonna discuss that in this entry, insya Allah in future entries we'll have a debate about that. =)
Anyway, we went to Amsterdam Central to take a train to that city and we bought the tickets. Train was supposed to leave at 1411, subsequent one was at 1441. So we ran over to the platform, saw the train, but missed it by a matter of seconds. We were quite frustrated, but Allah knows best. It was for the best that we missed that train. Why???
Looking at train timings.
Saw this at Centraal Station. Sold both medicine and drugs. Hehe.
Because we took the 1441 train, and when we arrived at The Hague's station, we saw a Malay-looking couple with their daughter! So i approached them, and asked if they were Malaysians, and if they knew the way to the embassy. They said they were going there too, so we could go with them! So lucky! If not we wouldn't be able to find sey, coz it's so 'hulu'! Alhamdulillaah! And that 'Abang', as we called him, gave me his name card after we talked a bit. It read: University Malaya: Associate Professor Wan Suhaimi- Bachelors from Al-Azhar, Masters from Uni of Cairo, PHD from University Malaya. OMG!!!! He was that good! But you could never tell from his looks! He dressed normally! No way you could tell that he was an ulama'! He is in Holland (city of Leiden, not Amsterdam), because he's a research fellow at Uni of Leiden momentarily, while his wife does her PHD here. His wife is doing PHD in space law! As in outer space law! I didn't even know there was such a discipline! But they were so freaking humble! Masya Allah. I'm really impressed by them. If we had taken the 1411 train, we wouldn't have met them, and chances are, we wouldn't even find the embassy!
The time spent at the Embassy was fantastic. The food was great, the maulud I liked, the syarahan was good (though I didn't understand the need for a tahlil, felt like it didn't blend with the occasion). And guess who gave the syarahan? Mr Wan Suhaimi himself! They all called him Ustad over there! Me and Fadhil, after the event, started calling him Ustad too, instead of Abang! Haha. But it was nice. Really. I had fun. The people there were soo nice, despite me being Singaporean! One guy from the embassy asked whether I was a student there. I said yes, but I'm a Singaporean. Then he said,"Then what are you doing here???" Haha! But he was kidding, thankfully! Haha. He even said, anytime I feel like eating Malay food or just spending some time, I'm welcomed at the Embassy. They were really really wonderful hosts.
Everything about the trip was awesome. From the train ride (seeing all the sights including the countryside of Holland) to the company, and not least, the food! Alhamdulillaah!
I have so much more to blog about, about the 'Fitna' movie etc, but I'll wait till I finish my exams for this block on Thursday. So pardon the lack of inactivity on my blog, though in light of what's been happening, I don't think there will be inactivity at all on my tagboard.:p
Meanwhile, enjoy some pics of my trip.
In the train
Now you know how a Dutch police car look like.=)
The ICJ.
5 comments:
Wah, so many places to go.......Hmm..must stay longer in AMS then ;-) Must start planning our trip soon, after ur exams =) Study hard & all the best for ur exams!
plan what trip? please eh. no haram stuff between you and walid. aku bilang mak bapak kau dua yang korang buat benda tak senonoh baru tahu! sial-sial punya anak.
To the person above, I pray that Allah will show you His guidance.
To all 3 above, I pray that Allah will show you His guidance. Berzina is worse than murder. Mengumpat is worse than zina.
to imposter. jgn biadab! go and do smthg that is more meaningful.
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